Mutilate aoe question

At one mob, I run my single target rotation. I never once press fan or tempest.
At one hundred mobs, I believe I run nothing but fans and tempests. If I have so much energy and combo points that I will be spamming tempests, I'll throw an envenom to get the buff and continue.

But what do I do at three mobs? Four? Six? Eight?

When do I keep a slice running, and at how many is that not worth it? Is it ever better to use envenom with full energy and then spam fan during envenom buff? When should I multi-rupture? How many ruptures, and how big should each one be?

Do we have definitive answers yet? I'm doing fine running with intuition, but it would be great to know!

tempest is pretty bad, and at 10 mobs tempest would reach the AoE cap and do no more damage for 100000 targets than it did for 10.

A few things to keep in mind. rupture is a decent source of your energy
posions are the vast majority of your damage
envenom increases poison application chance by 20% (nice but not HUGE)

What i would say for "cleave" dps (2-5ish) would be keep SnD up, try to get rupture going on as many as possible, FoK tons. More ruptures = more FoKs. Post bug fix i dont see CT ever really having a place in mut's rotation. The question is envenom vs ruptures.

tempest is pretty bad, and at 10 mobs tempest would reach the AoE cap and do no more damage for 100000 targets than it did for 10.

Errr... doesn't the dot work like deadly? I haven't tested, I honestly don't know. But why would this dot be limited?

What i would say for "cleave" dps (2-5ish) would be keep SnD up, try to get rupture going on as many as possible, FoK tons.

Right, at 2-5 it's pretty clear that this is a good idea. But a bunch of 1 point ruptures? 2? 3? Full 5 point ruptures all around can't be right!

More ruptures = more FoKs. Post bug fix i dont see CT ever really having a place in mut's rotation. The question is envenom vs ruptures.

I really thought CT's damage would make it worthwhile with enough targets- my guess was around 7. CT dot really isn't bad. Hrm.

---------- Post added 2012-11-30 at 12:42 AM ----------

Oh, and you probably wouldn't "FoK tons" at 2 mobs. At 5, sure. But at two I would think I would run mutilates for CPs and make sure both had rupture and deadly ticking. So when to switch from Mutilate to Fan for a combo builder would be nice to know.

Errr... doesn't the dot work like deadly? I haven't tested, I honestly don't know. But why would this dot be limited?

The DoT does "30% of the initial damage". So if my damage to 10 targets is 100,000, then each target will get hit for 10,000 and bleed for 3,000. total damage done is 130,000. If i hit 100 targets then each will get hit for 1,000 and bleed for 300, total damage done 130,000

FoK is the same, the "AoE cap" is 10 targets worth of damage and it splits after that, but each hit has an independent chance to proc poison so if i hit 100000 targets, the FoK damage will be pathetic, however the poison will do just as much damage PER TARGET as if i hit 2 targets, 5 targets, 10, however many. technically there is no limit to our AoE potential due to this.

Right, at 2-5 it's pretty clear that this is a good idea. But a bunch of 1 point ruptures? 2? 3? Full 5 point ruptures all around can't be right!

This i cant tell you unfortunately :-/ I'm not sure anyone has that answer. We could break it down a bit. 5 CP rupture has the highest DPS, but not necessarily the highest number of ticks per CP (since that is what we are hoping to achieve anyway).

So the energy cost per GCD goes up each time. of course passive energy regen comes into play.. im sure a sim would do it much better, but overall, it looks like 1 CP isnt that bad of an idea if you have tons and tons of mobs, how long they will live, how many they have tons of variables

I really thought CT's damage would make it worthwhile with enough targets- my guess was around 7. CT dot really isn't bad. Hrm.

Not abysmal at 7, however compared to a 5 CP rupture (vs a 5 CP CT), same 7 targets, looking at the damage of rupture/venomous wounds (not huge) and 100 energy (rupture cost 10 less than CT, on top of 90 on average regained) which would make for 2.86 FoKs, and 10 poison procs (2.86... *7 targets *.5 chance for posion to proc).

so while CT isnt terrible, every time you do that over rupture youre costing yourself almost 3 FoKs, not to mention the almost 3 CP that comes with it

[/COLOR]Oh, and you probably wouldn't "FoK tons" at 2 mobs. At 5, sure. But at two I would think I would run mutilates for CPs and make sure both had rupture and deadly ticking. So when to switch from Mutilate to Fan for a combo builder would be nice to know.

Usually if i have 3 targets that will be awake for a long target (and 3 of course as well) i'd keep a rupture and deadly poison ticking on each of them. keep in mind that the DoT damage of deadly poison is very very nice. usually targeting them and auto attacking for like 1 second (50% chance and our auto attacks are fast!) puts it on them. No idea on the exact number to switch to FoK. i usually do at 5. at 4 i may fan occasionally to keep the DP on everyone while i build up ruptures initially

Lots of 1 combo point Ruptures is quite a large DPS loss. The amount of energy it takes to put up those 1 combo point Ruptures won't be earned back in energy and time you could have used Fan of Knives. Few 5 combo point Ruptures seems to net a bigger gain.

I personally use Crimson Tempest on any pack with more than 7 targets. Anything less and I will tab 5 combo point Ruptures around. While I agree with Eijin on Crimson Tempest being a crap ability, it does actually do significantly more damage than one Fan of Knives at 5 combo points at pretty much no loss.

Hmm, 2 things with the above post. In my post i broke down the energy used in each CP level and at 1 CP (1 FoK 1 rupture) it actually has the lowest energy spent per second of any number. This is because 1 CP = 8 seconds, where every additional CP only gives 4 seconds.

also you mention a 5 CP CT being > 1 FoK, but in my post i explained how one 5 pt CT is a trade off for almost 3 FoKs (2.83 FoKs, the poison procs from them, and the 2.83 CP from them) brings, as youre spending 100 more energy overall.

Mel'jarak would support single-target focus after the first add pack is down anyway, since he takes increased damage - but that does bring up a good point; before you're AoEing GIANT packs of enemies, assuming you're auto-attacking something, envenom still has a bonus outside FoK (some damage + more AA poisons), so any primary target + AoE would lend itself to envenom even IF CT were ahead for the AoE itself. The legendary daggers are an interesting idea there, didn't expect that o.O

Hmm, 2 things with the above post. In my post i broke down the energy used in each CP level and at 1 CP (1 FoK 1 rupture) it actually has the lowest energy spent per second of any number. This is because 1 CP = 8 seconds, where every additional CP only gives 4 seconds.

also you mention a 5 CP CT being > 1 FoK, but in my post i explained how one 5 pt CT is a trade off for almost 3 FoKs (2.83 FoKs, the poison procs from them, and the 2.83 CP from them) brings, as youre spending 100 more energy overall.

You posted some numbers without backing them up with formulas. I can't tell if you calculated in the energy return from Relentless Strikes. Venomous Wounds has a 2 second internal cooldown and by using 5 combo point Ruptures you can have 2 going at all times. Having lots of 1 combo point Ruptures costs a huge amount of energy which could otherwise be spend spamming Fan of Knives. At the end of the day this method will only allow you to keep roughly 3 rolling because of the steep energy cost you need to spend to get them up in the first place. Besides if what you said was the case, why wouldn't you only use 1 combo point Ruptures in a single target rotation? It's been calculated a very long time ago that higher combo point Ruptures gives you a much bigger reward.

On average a 1 combo point Rupture costs 20 energy (25 cost, 20% chance to refund 25 energy, 20 energy on average).
On average a 5 combo point Rupture costs 0 energy (25 cost, 100% chance to refund 25 energy, 0 energy on average).
You are only keeping 3 Ruptures up by using the 1 combo point method and two by using the 5 combo point method. There is the slightly higher chance of getting a Venomous Wounds proc but it's not that much bigger. And in the end, you are losing 40 energy every two 1 combo point Ruptures you put up. That's more than one free Fan of Knives you are giving up on, our real damage source when AoEing.

Crimson Tempest can proc poisons as well. In very large AoE situations Crimson Tempest's damage is quite far above one Fan of Knives, and that at the cost of only 10 energy. Crimson Tempest is roughly 35% stronger compared to one Fan of Knives, which makes up for the 10 energy spend. Granted you can't use those 5 combo points for something else like a Rupture, but this is where the very delicate situations of the number of targets comes in.

And that is something I'm still not sure about. Like I said in my previous post, the sweet spot I found was 7+ targets before trading in Ruptures for Crimson Tempests. In reality I think 7 is only barely making Crimson Tempest worth it.

Crimson Tempest is still a crap ability and it's hardly going to effect your DPS if used correctly. I wouldn't be surprised to see topics show up about this much like Rupture for Combat. Ask 100 different Rogues and they will all give you a different answer.

Not trying to argue with you or anything, just having a friendly discussion.

Something i wasn't aware of is the 2 sec internal CD. It seems reasonable but i haven't heard it before. That would instantly shut down anything over 2 ruptures, and diminish the second rupture considerably. Honestly though, it makes the calculations easier. I still havent noticed much from a 5 CP CT, i used it quite a bit when it was bugged. Its between CT's damage + DoT, or 15% chance extra to apply poison (and envenom's damage, which isnt so high). Also, as i stated earlier, poisons can break the AoE cap, so if CT does cross envenom at 7, there would be a number where envenom passed back over it. Ill see if i can pull up logs at work and kinda get a reasonable number for how much damage my CT, envenom and poison does in a raid scenario and do some math.

The 2 second internal cooldown thing has been added at the start of MoP. I'm unaware if they reverted it back in 5.1 but I highly doubt that. If that internal cooldown wasn't there it would have indeed been a much more complex thing to calculate.

As for Crimson Tempest, I still don't fully understand why they added this abomination in. I was personally experiencing higher DPS on 7+ targets if I weaved in Crimson Tempest. Maybe it was just RNG, maybe my logs were bugged, or maybe my cat was dreaming about a pink pony last night. Whatever the case was the ''gain'' was so miniscule that I'm still not fully convinced if Crimson Tempest was worth it. You may very well be correct that Envenom or Rupture is a bigger DPS gain. But I personally noticed 7+ targets was the point where Crimson Tempest was worth using. Not by much, but enough not to feel bad about myself for using an ability just because it looks cool.

EDIT:
Right I'm really, really starting to doubt myself now. I can't find any information or proof anywhere about Venomous Wounds having a 2 second internal cooldown now. I'm 100% sure I saw this mentioned in patch notes somewhere but I can't seem to find it anymore. I only quit my Rogue a few days ago, I can't be this rusty, can I?

EDIT2:
Just logged in in-game and threw a quick Rupture up on 4 different targets. It seems like it does proc more often than once every 2 seconds. I don't know anymore, maybe I was wrong after all. I'm still standing by my point that you can't really afford the energy to put up lots of 1 combo point Ruptures but... this Venomous Wounds thing would be a big fuckup if it doesn't have an internal cooldown. If I'm wrong which seems to be the case, I would like to know where I got this idea from.

Ahh, I didnt think it was there in DS, i played combat fully until i got a bit into raiding and played catch up from there. I havent heard anything about it being taken off, so safe to assume it hasnt been.

CT was a very good idea imo due to the lack of a real AoE finisher. Problem is, it just dosnt hit hard enough to truely be effective. For a bit the DoT was very very strong, but it seems it was toned down before/shortly after live. The cat dreaming of pink ponies does lead to higher DPS due to a bug, im sure it will be fixed soon im sure, but more importantly was the "higher dps with 7+ targets" before 5.1 or after? (you said last night so im thinking after).

I wouldnt suggest doing 1 rupture per target, was just saying it isnt that abysmal to do so. I personally usually get 4-5 usually in most situations where the targets will live long enough for me not to cap out on energy when they die (and waste energy).

So from what im showing, with no ICD, is 1 CP is still the least "cost per GCD" (per GCD so its relevent to passive energy regen as well, whatever your energy regen is would be deducted from each number).
cost is rupture (25) + FoK (35) x whatever it takes to achieve that number of CP. so 5 cp is 25+35+35+35+35+35. ticks is the ticks of rupture)
Energy regened is the 10 from each tick of venomous wounds (ticks of rupture *.75 * 10) + relentless strikes (5 per CP, which would be the average at CP*.2 *25)
energy per GCD is total energy spent - energy regained / number of actions (CP+1 for rupture)

CT cost 10 energy, rupture at 5 CP cost -90. so still a 100 energy diffrence between the two. still 2.86 FoKs as a trade off

actually had customers at work today! she is currently on her phone when all this was typed. Ill still pull up the numbers for poison/CT/envenom later and kinda see the number there.

I'm really beyond confused. Like I have a complete blackout right now, I'm so sure there was an internal cooldown added in MoP but the only thing I can find is other posts of mine where I say the same thing. I think it would be wise for me to keep my hands off the Venomous Wounds topic for now.

Where do you get the energy cost from by the way? Is that from the combo point generation? I personally wouldn't count that in, you are spamming Fan of Knives anyway so the combo points are basically ''free'' and you aren't spending energy to gain combo points, but to spread poisons around. The only cost associated with using Rupture is the energy you need to spend to get Rupture up. That energy spend goes at the cost of Fan of Knives. Or is my thought process wrong here?

But like I said, I tried messing around with Venomous Wounds in-game a little while ago and it definitely looked like it procced way more often than once every 2 seconds. So I might be making more mistakes.

I quit my Rogue roughly 2 weeks ago and before that I wasn't able to do much raiding because our guild was falling apart. That was the last time I actually paid attention to Crimson Tempest, so yes this way before the bug fix. That might have and probably influenced the numbers as well.

Maybe it's time to permanently move over to the Hunter forums now. I have cute fuzzy pets to show off.

I broke down the energy cost in there. the reason its included in is because it was origionally made for the argument of how many CP should you build up. If you dont count the FoKs it took to generate those CP than the cost would always be 25, if it was just as easy to do a 5 pt rupture as it was to do a 1 pt rupture, why on earth would you not? But by doing FoK rupture, FoK rupture, FoK rupture youre actually spending less energy per second than you would if you did FoK FoK FoK FoK FoK rupture. Even taking into account relentless blades and venomous wounds.

The "net cost" for ruptures leaves out an issue that you're tracking by GCD, and not by the # of FoKs you get out while putting up ruptures. That's what we're most interested in, isn't it? =) If rupture = FoK in value for damage, then energy/GCD of applying ruptures is important, but we're missing the point that you're also applying energy into those ruptures. For applying a 1 CP rupture, you "gain" 10 energy (35-25). For applying a 5 CP rupture, you "gain" 90 energy (115-25), making each CP increase the energy return value of applying rupture. The net energy per GCD, counting FoK-CP-gen energy cost, is higher (slightly), resulting in lower APM, but it SHOULD be higher FoK/M, unless my brain's really not functioning right now.

I broke down the energy cost in there. the reason its included in is because it was origionally made for the argument of how many CP should you build up.

Ah excuse me, yea that makes more sense.

Originally Posted by eijin

If you dont count the FoKs it took to generate those CP than the cost would always be 25, if it was just as easy to do a 5 pt rupture as it was to do a 1 pt rupture, why on earth would you not? But by doing FoK rupture, FoK rupture, FoK rupture youre actually spending less energy per second than you would if you did FoK FoK FoK FoK FoK rupture. Even taking into account relentless blades and venomous wounds.

Okay I'm with you now on that. I can see this potentially being better on short AoE bursts, but what about long terms AoE? The energy you gain gets higher the higher combo point Ruptures you use, wouldn't it make more sense assuming you start at a full energy bar to get 5 combo point Ruptures up instead? If you start at 0 energy I can see it being a big loss to wait for 5 combo points before applying your first Rupture, as it's a lot of time and potential energy lost.

Originally Posted by eijin

Daggers > cute pets!

*Covers tiger pet's ears*
Don't get me wrong I'm still completely in love with my Rogue. I just don't feel melee have a place this tier. But that's a little off topic.

Originally Posted by Mugajak

The "net cost" for ruptures leaves out an issue that you're tracking by GCD, and not by the # of FoKs you get out while putting up ruptures. That's what we're most interested in, isn't it? =) If rupture = FoK in value for damage, then energy/GCD of applying ruptures is important, but we're missing the point that you're also applying energy into those ruptures. For applying a 1 CP rupture, you "gain" 10 energy (35-25). For applying a 5 CP rupture, you "gain" 90 energy (115-25), making each CP increase the energy return value of applying rupture. The net energy per GCD, counting FoK-CP-gen energy cost, is higher (slightly), resulting in lower APM, but it SHOULD be higher FoK/M, unless my brain's really not functioning right now.

This is making a lot of sense, mainly the second part. Right now I'm just having a major disconnect with what I've experienced in-game and the math on paper. I've tried both method over and over and lots of 1 combo point Ruptures has always been less DPS on logs and recount. The math on paper, as you two explained, really does seem to favor the lots of 1 combo point Ruptures method.

Now I'm still not sure if Venomous Wounds has an internal cooldown or not. If it does, it would completely break the method. But as I said before I remember seeing this in MoP patch notes (before 5.1) and now can't find it anywhere anymore. Even my little test in-game showed I was wrong, but I would still like to hear it from someone else to be 100% sure. More importantly, if I'm wrong, where did I pick up this idea? Was it maybe an old patchnote that has been scrapped?

The "net cost" for ruptures leaves out an issue that you're tracking by GCD, and not by the # of FoKs you get out while putting up ruptures. That's what we're most interested in, isn't it? =) If rupture = FoK in value for damage, then energy/GCD of applying ruptures is important, but we're missing the point that you're also applying energy into those ruptures. For applying a 1 CP rupture, you "gain" 10 energy (35-25). For applying a 5 CP rupture, you "gain" 90 energy (115-25), making each CP increase the energy return value of applying rupture. The net energy per GCD, counting FoK-CP-gen energy cost, is higher (slightly), resulting in lower APM, but it SHOULD be higher FoK/M, unless my brain's really not functioning right now.

I followed the first part of your post, but the second lost me a bit. Im not against my math being wrong, it happens, but wouldnt a 1 CP rupture be 8 seconds, giving you 4 ticks, each with a 75% chance of proccing VW. 4*.75 = 3, with 3 VW you would get 30 energy. Relentless strikes at 1 CP would give a 20% chance of 25 energy. on average 25*.2 = 5 energy regained. 30+5 = 35 energy, meaning a 1 CP rupture pays for 1 FoK? Not needing 3.5

---------- Post added 2012-11-30 at 04:56 PM ----------

Originally Posted by Bovan

Okay I'm with you now on that. I can see this potentially being better on short AoE bursts, but what about long terms AoE? The energy you gain gets higher the higher combo point Ruptures you use, wouldn't it make more sense assuming you start at a full energy bar to get 5 combo point Ruptures up instead? If you start at 0 energy I can see it being a big loss to wait for 5 combo points before applying your first Rupture, as it's a lot of time and potential energy lost.

Long term has so many variables :-/ but the important thing is; you dont get more energy the higher the CP. a 1 CP rupture is 4 ticks, 2 is 6 ticks, you gained 50% from double the CP, 3 CP is 8 ticks, for 3 times the CP gain you get double the ticks of 1 CP. This is because it starts off at 4 for 1 CP but each increase above that only adds 2. Now the damage scales up as you increase CP (ruptures damage itself). relenetless blades scales linearly, every CP you have is, on average, worth 5 energy regain (20% chance per CP. so CP*.2*25)

fully 110% agree that it is very unlikely to be worth it to wait for 5 CP on your very first rupture. i'd probably say 3 would be a sweet spot (starting from a full energy bar)

1 CP ruptures are very linely not worth it shy of mass AoE situations, much more time spent doing non AoE actions, although technically for longevity it isnt the worst thing, that dosnt make it the best. ruptures damage isnt terrible in a moderate number of targets, of course the more targets you get ruptures actual damage gets less and less important. Im not by any means saying to use 1 CP ruptures, just showing that they do have a use (the energy efficiency)

5 energy for a 1CP rupture, I don't know how I got 10, wow. I was talking about the net energy gain for casting rupture at any given CP, since you don't give a damn about the damage from rup, barely about VW, and just want the energy.

At 1 CP, rupture costs 25 energy and provides 30. Casting a 1 CP rupture 7* times will fund a new FoK. Casting a 5 CP rupture (cost 25, refund 115, net gain 90) is 2 new FoKs with 20 leftover energy toward a third. Your energy used modeling is accurate by second, but FoKx5->Rup yields higher energy use ON FoK. In a 1 CP model, you spend barely more energy on FoK than you do on rupture (35/25), as opposed to the spenditure on a 5-CP rup rotation (175/25). Energy PER second used on 1-CP ruptures is lower, but your FoK/S is WAY down by comparison.

As long as we're talking AoE, the only part of rupture that matters is how much MORE energy is gained from venomous wounds than rupture cost to cast. At 1 CP, you gain 30 at the cost of 25 (5), and at 5 you gain 110 at the cost of 25 (90). 90 energy > 5 energy (or 5*5 energy, counting all 5 CPs) for using more FoK.

I get you, talking about the net gain of it takes 7 to pay for 1 FoK (before RS).

I agree, the potential damage for 1 CP ruptures is lower, that makes perfect since. While you will technically have more energy to perform FoK with, you will be spending a larger percentage of that energy on rupture.

Ive looked since i got home (work computer blocks most WoW sites, they expect me to actually do my job or something) and haven't been able to find any evidence of a VW ICD. post 5.1 and in the absence of a GCD, i would say rupturing with as many CP as makes since based on how long the targets will live, envenoming enough to keep slice and dice going (after a while, with enough targets, your single target passive damage will be tiny compared to all the AoE poison damage) and FoK your heart out.